Not Without My Backpack: One Day in Bangkok

We spent just one full day in Bangkok. We arrived late, so we got ourselves checked in and bought some snacks at the "family mart" across the street for dinner. At that point, we thought we might stay two days in Bangkok, but before booking extra nights at the hotel, we decided to see what day one was like. In the morning we went to the Grand Palace, which is actually a large complex full of temples, shrines, and palaces. The Grand Palace has a dress code which prohibits shorts, short pants, short skirts, tank tops, or see through shirts...yes, see through shirts are actually on their list of prohibited clothes. I put my serong on around my shorts. For some reason, the wrap Britainy brought to cover her shoulders was deemed not good enough so she had to rent a shirt to wear over her tank top. Ladies' shirts were gone so she selected a nice blue short-sleeved man's shirt. We called it her "prison blues." We were all looking good as we entered the Grand Palace.
After a few hours there we decided to go hide from the sun for a while in a restaurant. We walked to Khao San Road, where backpackers tend to gather due to the numerous cheap hotels and guesthouses. The short street is lined with shops selling handcrafts, clothes, and pirated dvds, as well as pubs and bars. There, we selected a restaurant that looked somewhat busy and I had my first Pad Thai of many while in Thailand.
When we were a bit more rested, we walked back through the city, past the Grand Palace to visit Wat Pho, an important Buddhist temple complex. We saw the "Reclining Buddha" which is quite impressive due to its enormous size. We viewed a few other sites before the heat and humidity had finally taken its toll on us and we decided to head back to the hotel. Little did we know that would be an adventure in itself.
We found a taxi that would take us back to the metro station for the taxi fare that we had requested, as long as we agreed to go to his friend's shop on the way. We climbed in and set off. Two hours later...two hours(!) we had only gone a few miles and had not even made it to the shop. I thought traffic in L.A. was bad. Its nothing compared to Bangkok. We simply didn't move. Finally, we got out of the taxi and walked. If we had waited any longer, it would have gotten dark before we found our way back to the hotel. It took us about an hour to make our way back to the metro station. After a long, hot, sticky day in Bangkok, we all agreed that the next day we should head to the beach instead of having a second day in the city.